


No Matter the Wreckage

by Polarbears_at_lunchtime



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Gen, Grief/Mourning, James and Lily Potters' funeral
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-07-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:20:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25564228
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Polarbears_at_lunchtime/pseuds/Polarbears_at_lunchtime
Summary: "The most beautiful stories always start with wreckage." -Jack LondonRemus Lupin mourns James and Lily Potter, and a new story begins.
Relationships: Albus Dumbledore & Remus Lupin, James Potter/Lily Evans Potter, Remus Lupin & Severus Snape
Comments: 8
Kudos: 15





	No Matter the Wreckage

James and Lily Potters’ funeral is a modest affair. 

There are only a handful of mourners, and Remus knows every single one of them; there are very few of them left, after all. 

It’s small, but it is better that way, Remus thinks. Half the Wizarding world would turn up if they could, and that would be far worse. There should not be anyone there who celebrated at their deaths.

Instead, there’s Dumbledore and Minerva, draped in dark robes with their usually-bright spectacles misty-- somber echoes of the sprightly professors they once learned from. They had to become soldiers, generals, warriors; they left the chalkboard behind.

There's Kingsley and Alastor, backs straight with the razor focus of Aurors at attention, standing stern and solemn on the sides. They are here for friendship, yes, but out of obligation, too. A last honor owed for a great sacrifice. They are men of duty. Sacrifice, they know all too well.

And finally, theres's Alice and Frank Longbottom, looking faded with exhaustion and sorrow, and their little boy held close in their arms. They're still bright, though; vivid and alive. The three of them stand, together and whole, like a mirror image of the Potters, chosen by a coin flip of fate. Lucky, perhaps.

Lily’s sister and her family are there, as well. They stand at the front, looking quite discomfited by the motley collection of characters in attendance, surrounded by an atmosphere of loss they cannot fully grasp. They are mourning Lily, but they mourn the memory of a girl. They did not know the woman, the mother, the soldier. 

Amidst the long robes and strange accessories, they are out of place. The boy seems mainly befuddled, but Dursley goes pale every time Alastor's new eye spins toward him; it's a little bit funny- or would be, on any day but this one. 

Remus has only met Petunia once before, but he knows--from long talks with Lily on late night prefect rounds when the halls are quiet and empty--that it is the magic that bothers her. It is clear from her face that she blames it for the funeral they are at today. She is not entirely wrong.

She organized the event, Remus is fairly sure. _Somewhat_ , anyway, because the fact that they’re in Godric’s Hollow means Dumbledore almost certainly had a hand in it. Petunia likely would have preferred a nicely organized Muggle cemetery with headstones in neat, ordered rows—not the haphazard scatter that’s found here, where the graves list sideways with the weight of centuries and the crisp November air is laden with magic.

Yet, here they are, only meters from where James and Lily lived—and died. 

It’s the place James grew up, where Harry would have grown up, too. It’s overlaid with memories, thick and wild as nettles.

Just over there is the field where they played Quidditch that summer before fourth year, when Remus fell in the stream trying to catch the Quaffle. A five minutes’ walk north is the pub they snuck out to and got smashed when Peter’s girlfriend dumped him when they were sixteen. By that old oak tree with the wide roots is where Sirius—

The air is cold this morning. Every now and then it cuts sharp in his lungs. 

The morning frost underfoot crunches as the mourners trickle out. 

There are too many things to do, with the war ending, for anyone to linger long. They have jobs to do, families to get back to. They murmur kind things to him as they pass, and he nods dutifully.

Dursley had left a while ago, to sit in the auto where it was warm, all the while muttering under his breath and taking his pudgy baby with him. Remus hadn’t been sorry to see him go.

But now Petunia is turning to leave, Harry in her arms, and he steps forward suddenly and jerkily, his hands opened uncertainly.

“Can I—?” 

She purses her lips but hands him over brusquely. Her pink coat crinkles like plastic as she holds the boy away from herself. Remus reaches out carefully, accepting Harry like a sacrament.

“I’ll be in the auto,” she says through thin lips before clomping away. He barely hears.

There is a baby in his arms now, and Remus is cradling him like something holy and precious.

Harry makes a low, unhappy noise, and by instinct Remus’ hand goes to stroke the back of his head and rub his back. He quiets easily, to Remus’ surprise, with a soft sigh of contentment.

And it’s… it’s… 

The center of his world contracts, and all of his spiraling grief fades as his focus narrows to a single point. The boy is heavy and small and so much warmer than Remus had expected, like a little furnace.

His chubby cheek rests against the man’s shoulder. A gesture of a trust that has never been broken. 

He is a tiny, whole thing in a broken, broken world.

Together they stand like an island, as Remus gets lost in the motion and Harry is lulled into calm.

There is time, but not enough, until Dumbledore comes to gather his charge.

The man approaches as inexorable as the tides, his robes sweeping against the light dusting of snow, and Remus clutches Harry tighter. He gets a reproving, expectant look for that. He cannot just walk away, though. Not from this.

“Albus—” he leans toward the man, hating how desperate he feels. “What—what if I took the child?”

Steady eyes turn upon him, and he swallows under the weight of that gaze. When the wizard speaks, it is with terrible kindness. “Remus,” he begins.

His answer doesn’t need to be verbalized for Remus to hear it.

“No! Please,” he begs. “Petunia, she—I’m sure she’d give Harry a good life, but… they wouldn’t fit. They wouldn’t understand. She loved Lily—God knows, she _loved_ Lily—but she didn’t really know her,” Remus shakes his head. “Not anymore. Not the world she became a part of, not the man she loved, nor what she fought for, died for…" 

He swallows. "And _Harry._ He deserves to grow up knowing who his parents were and knowing who he is. Magic and all.”

He takes a breath. He’s shaking his head, but he needs to say this. “And I know… I _know_ I’m a sorry excuse for a man. I know I haven’t much money. But Albus, I’d _love him_. I’d love him _so much_. I already do. Just… _Please_.” 

He’d get on his knees if he thought it might help. Remus Lupin is a man with little in the world besides his pride, but he would beg if he thought it would help. 

He knows it will not, though. Albus Dumbledore is not a man who can be swayed by pity. His heart is kind, but his will is iron and it rarely bends.

“Remus. You are a fine young man. _Not_ a sorry excuse for anything,” comes the firm reassurance, accompanied by a scolding tilt of the head. The headmaster pauses and sighs. “... However, you are also a werewolf; and through no fault of your own, that makes you unfit to be young Harry’s guardian.” 

And there it is, the crushing truth laid down like law. Still—

“It’s only one night a—”

“ _Remus_ ,” he says sternly. Then, more gently: “Remus. We both know that is not quite true. You would be a single, young man whose struggles with unemployment would not be improved by being burdened with an infant’s childcare. I know you care for Harry. You are a good friend to the Potters even now. But Petunia and Vernon will be conscientious and sensitive guardians for the boy. They will not—”

“ _—Sensitive?_ ” Remus splutters. “I just heard Dursley say that Lily and James ‘topped themselves with a ruddy magic trick gone wrong’!”

“ _They are family,_ ” Albus Dumbledore pronounces, in that way of his that says: this is truth, this is final. And it is: so terribly final.

“They are family,” the wizard repeats. “They will keep him safe and give him a good childhood; a peaceful and quiet one away from the turmoil of the wizarding world. Away from the weighty mantle that his fame will be. He will be safe and happy.”

Remus sways. “I…”

A hand reaches out to steady him.

“You want what is best for Harry, Remus. I know. So do I.” 

Half-moon glasses frame a solemn gaze. 

“It is for Harry that we must entrust him to their care. It is for Harry’s sake… you must let go.”

Remus swallows against the burning in his eyes.

As if aware of the discussion about him, the little boy in his arm squirms in his puffy winter coat. He’s such a good boy, Remus thinks. He didn’t make a fuss all throughout the ceremony even while the Dudley baby wailed. 

He’s such a good boy, and Remus wants to watch him grow up. He wants to hug him like Lily would and take him flying like James wanted to. He wants to show and teach him all the things his parents never will, because he owes them a lifetime and then some. They should have had this and everything.

And he doesn’t want to lose Harry, this beautiful child, the last piece of the only beautiful thing he has ever had in his life. 

This is going to break his heart.

It is going to break his heart, but when he says goodbye, it will be final. For Harry’s safety, when he says goodbye, they will not meet again.

The child must be hidden, and he must be protected. 

Even from Remus. 

He can’t stop the hot tears that flow, even as a few drop into Harry’s wild black hair. _James_ ’ wild black hair. 

Harry has Lily’s eyes, too, he knows, but Harry is nestling closer now, like he’s trying to fall asleep in Remus arms, and his eyes are closed, and oh god, if he opens them and Remus sees them even one more time, he’ll never be able to let go.

Albus’ arms are held out.

Remus surrenders.

It is silent and white there in the clearing, filled with a deadened peace. 

He is alone, again.

“The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death,” he says aloud. 

The words curve beautifully on the hard, gray stone that he reads them from.

... and Remus can’t help but hate it. It sounds wise and lofty and profound and not like the Potters _at all._

They would probably be sniggering like fools if Remus had ever quoted it to them. 

“Indulging in mournful soliloquies now, Lupin? I always knew you were the type.”

He doesn’t know how long Snape has been there, hiding in the background, but if he had to guess, he would say since before the funeral even began. 

He must have been waiting, like a wild, wary creature keeping its distance. Safely away from the crowds of civilized people, which Remus does not, apparently, count as.

“Just a bit of light reading,” he says flatly. He can’t someone the energy for a verbal riposte with Snape right now. “Mournful just seems to be the trend around here,” he gestures around the graveyard.

Snape’s gaze skirts the cemetery before landing on Remus again. “Funny, that.”

“Not really.”

“No. Not really.”

They stand side by side, in flowing black robes and tatty gray coat as the snow settles on their shoulders. 

There is nothing to say. They share nothing but grief. Still, the occasion seems to demand a word. It is Snape who speaks first.

“It wasn’t supposed to be this way.”

Flakes of white drift aimlessly. Remus inhales amidst the swirl.

“It should’ve been us.” 

There is no hesitation in Snape’s slow breath and nod. He understands perfectly.

“It should’ve been us,” he agrees. 

Around them, slowly, even the footprints are covered as the new snow falls.

**Author's Note:**

> No Matter the Wreckage is the title of a work of poetry by Sarah Kay.


End file.
